Treatise on Poisons by Sir Robert Christison

old. On the trial of Captain Donnellan for poisoning Sir T. Boughton, Mr. John Hunter mentioned that he had met with two instances of death from apoplexy in young women; my colleague Dr. Alison has related to me a similar case; Professor Bernt has described another of a young girl who died apoplectic from extravasation of blood over the whole brain and in the ventricles also;[1626] and Mr. Greenhow, a surgeon of London, has even noticed a case of apoplexy from effusion of blood over the surface of the brain in a child two years and a half old.[1627] On this subject the treatise of Rochoux supplies excellent information: of his sixty-three cases sixty-one were above thirty years of age, two less than thirty, none younger than twenty.[1628] It is plain, therefore, that apoplexy in young people is rare. On the other hand, a great proportion of cases of poisoning with the narcotics when they have been taken intentionally (and such cases are most likely to lead to medico-legal questions), has occurred among the young, especially of the female sex.